WHY, what harm will these books do me? The same harm that personal intercourse would with the bad men who wrote them. That, “A man is known by the company he keeps,” is an old proverb; but it is no more true than that a man’s character may be determined by knowing what books he reads. If a good book can be read without making one better, a bad book cannot be read without making one worse.
Lord Bacon makes the pithy remark, that “In the body there are three degrees of that we receive into it—aliment, medicine, and poison—whereof aliment is that which the nature of man can perfectly alter and overcome; medicine is that which is partly converted by nature and partly converteth nature; and poison is that which worketh wholly upon nature, without nature being able to work at all upon it; so in the mind, whatsoever knowledge reason cannot at all work upon and convert, is a mere intoxication, and endangereth a dissolution of the mind and understanding.”
Here we have a definition of what we mean by “bad books”: whatever books neither feed the mind nor purify the heart, but intoxicate the mind and corrupt the heart. (Sound) works of science, history, theology, etc., furnish “aliment” or “medicine”; books of fiction, romance, infidelity, etc., are “poison,” more or less diluted, and are as much to be shunned as the drunkard’s cup. They will “bite like a serpent, and sting like an adder.”
Books of mere fiction and fancy are generally bad in their character and influence. Their authors are commonly bad men, and wicked men do not often write good books. A stream does not rise higher than its fountain. Their principles are often corrupt, encouraging notions of chivalry, worldly honour, and pleasure, at war with the only true code of morals. They insult the understanding of the reader, by assuming that the great object of reading is amusement. The effects are such as might be expected. Familiarity with popular fiction gives a disrelish for simple truth, engenders a habit of reading merely for amusement, which destroys the love of sober investigation, and blasts the hope of mental improvement; renders scientific and historical reading tedious; gives false views of the perfectibility of human nature, thus leading to disappointments in the relations of life; and dwarfs the intellectual and moral powers, except the imagination, which is rendered morbid and unhealthy by constant excitement. The Bible becomes a wearisome book; spiritual classics, like those of Baxter, Bunyan, Flavel, and Doddridge, though glowing with celestial fire, become insipid and uninteresting; and the influence of the pulpit is undermined, by diverting the attention from serious things, and lessening the probability that truth will take effect upon the conscience; or, if it does for a time, the bewitching novel furnishes a ready means of stifling conviction, and grieving away the Spirit of God. A merchant in H. was under conviction for sin during a revival of religion. A pious friend called, and, to his surprise, found him engaged in reading a worthless novel. To his remonstrance against such trifling, he replied: “I am so interested in this book, I must finish it; and then I will attend to the affairs of my soul.” He finished the book. He attended to the concerns of his soul—never! Thousands have perished by similar seductive influences.
Beware of the foul and exciting romance. All that is said above will apply with tenfold intensity to this class of reading, for which it paves the way. The writer of modern romance chooses his scenes from the places of debauchery and crime, and familiarises the reader with characters, sentiments, and events that should be known only to the police. Licentious scenes and obscene imagery are unblushingly introduced, and the imagination polluted by suggestions and descriptions revolting to the pure in heart. “Public poisoners” was the title long since justly given to writers of this class. It was lately testified in open court, by the father of one whose guilty course has brought ruin upon herself, disgrace upon her family, and death upon her lover, that all was occasioned by his daughter “reading the impure works of Eugene Sue and Bulwer.” To yield to such a hellish charm is like the voluntary sacrifice of one’s body and soul on the drunkard’s altar. Mental delirium tremens is as sure a consequence of habitual intoxication from such reading, as is that awful disease the certain end of the inebriate. Beware of it.
Beware of infidel books and all writings which ridicule the Bible. You will meet them, with a more or less guarded avowal of their object, in the newspaper, the tract, and the volume. Infidelity is a system of negations. It is nothing—believes nothing—does nothing good. Beware of it, in whatever form it approaches you, as you value temporal happiness and prosperity, the peace of society, and eternal well-being. No man enters eternity an infidel.
Beware of books of piracy and murder. The first thought of crime has been suggested by such books. The murderer of Lord William Russell confessed on the scaffold that the reading of one such book led him to the commission of his crime. Another, who was executed for piracy, was instigated to his course by a book of piratical tales. The State prisons are filled with criminals who were incited to crime by similar means. They stimulate the love of adventurous daring, cultivate the baser passions, and prompt to deeds of infamy. Away with them!
Do you still need to be persuaded to beware of the poison that would paralyze your conscience, enervate your intellect, pervert your judgment, deprave your life, and perhaps ruin your soul?
Beware of bad books, because if you, and others like you, will let them alone, they will soon cease to be published. Every such book you buy encourages the guilty publisher to make another. Thus you not only endanger your own morals, but pay a premium on the means of ruining others.
Beware, because your example is contagious. Your child, your servant, your neighbour may be led to read what will be injurious for time and eternity; or not to “touch the unclean thing,” as your example may prompt.
Beware, because good books are plenty and cheap, and it is folly to feed on chaff or poison, when substantial, healthful food may as well be obtained.
Beware of bad books, because they waste your time. “Time is money;” it is more—it is eternity! God did not bring us into being, and sustain that being, the Redeemer did not shed His blood a ransom for our sins, the Holy Spirit has not bestowed upon us the book divine, that we might flit from flower to flower like the butterfly, neglecting all the ends of rational and immortal being, and go to the judgment mere triflers.
Beware of bad books, because principles imbibed and images gathered from them will abide in the memory and imagination for ever. The mind once polluted is never freed from its corruption—never, unless by an act of boundless grace, through the power of the Spirit of God.
Beware of them, because they are one of the most fruitful sources of eternal destruction. They are read in solitude. Their ravages are internal. Foundations of morality are undermined. The fatal arrow is fixed in the soul, while the victim only sees the gilded feather that guides its certain aim. He is lost, and descends to a hell the more intolerable from a contrast with the scenes of fancied bliss with which the heart was filled by the vile, though gifted, destroyer. The precious Book of Life was given to show you how you might secure the enrolment of your name among the saints in light, but you chose the book of death, which presents fascinations of a corrupt Press, and the surest means of securing a dreadful doom. If your epitaph were truly written, the passer-by in —— graveyard would read: “M—— acquired a taste for reading bad books, died without hope, and ‘went to his own place.'” Shall this be your epitaph, dear reader? If not, make this pledge before God: “Henceforth I will beware of bad books, and never read what can intoxicate, pollute, or deprave the mind and heart.”
- This Article, which appeared in some other publication, was sent us by a friend in Canada. We reproduce it with some brief omissions.—Ed.